


Wind

by MistressYin



Series: Just A Word [2]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Adorable Eleven, Christmas Shopping, Good Babysitter Steve Harrington, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Wise ELeven
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-02
Updated: 2018-11-02
Packaged: 2019-08-16 18:34:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16500590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistressYin/pseuds/MistressYin
Summary: Steve and Eleven prepare for Christmas.





	Wind

**Author's Note:**

> This is part two of the "Just a Word" series, and probably wont make to much sense without reading the first one before this. 
> 
> The word of the day is....WInd

Steve laughed to himself as he bundled in the stupid Christmas sweater he had received from the Byers that year. It was light pink with reindeer all over it, and he was almost 99% positive they hadn’t thought he’d actually wear it. The problem was that he had nothing else to wear for winter, seeing as his Mother had never bought anything and he wouldn’t really talk about his father. 

Today marked the beginning of holiday break, meaning an entire week off of school. At a much daker note, it was going to be his first Christmas without his parents.

Hopper was his current ‘Foster parent’ until he turned eighteen, which delighted Jane to no end because she appreciated his cooking. 

Speaking of Jane...

“Jane, should I ask?” 

He had given her simple instruction for their grocery visit, pick out the food that looks the yummiest and we’ll cook it all week. In her hands was as many Eggos as possible, and at a quick glance to the cart, she had stocked that up to.

“Okay...well, I can work with this. I can.” He assured her, which caused her to break out into a large grin as she dumped the frozen food into the cart and put her hand on her hips in satisfaction. 

“I don’t think we need this many...”

She pouted. “I like them. There good. Bitchin’” 

He looked up to the ceiling with a sigh. “Okay, ten boxes, tops. We’re going to make the most bitchin’ eggos you’ve ever had.”

Her smile was worth it.

They huddled together for warmth as they emptied the isles of chocolate syrup, caramel, whip cream, ice cream, cookie dough, and all the other toppings he could think of. 

“M&Ms!” he shouted, rushing towards them and grabbing the bag. 

“M&Ms?” Jane questioned. He shook his head. 

“You have much to learn.”

He threw in bacon just to see what bacon on eggos would taste like, (Probably not bad) and looked down at the money hopper had given him. 

15 bucks. A good amount, except bacon was expensive so...

The price of their cart was 19.83. 

He dug into his own wallet and pulled out some of the cash he’d been making from his new job at the mall (Scoops Ahoy), and helped the cashier pack the things into the bag. 

The girl raised an eyebrow at his odd choice of food. He motioned to Jane. 

“Kid’s weird.”

“She your sister?”

He heard Jane snort. 

“I’m taking that as a no?”

Steve just shrugged and rolled his cart away so he didn’t have to answer. Jane rushed to catch up with him, pulling up her white dress that Mrs. Wheeler bought her for Christmas upon Mike introducing them. 

It flared out at her waist, and had a red three quarter jacket over it, with a big bow under her chin. 

“Did I tell you how cute you look in that dress?” He teased as she hopped onto to the side of the grocery cart like Mike taught her to. 

She shook her head dully. “Cute? Like pretty and bitchin’?”

He hummed. “I guess. There is a slight different meaning for the words. Pretty is a word a guy would say to a girl, bitchin’ means like, uh, you look tough and stuff. Cute is something adults or older people say to kids when they think they look nice.”

Jane absorbed this information, smiling. “Mike called me pretty. And you called me cute. Different feelings towards each other means different words.”

Steve nodded. “Yea, exactly,” he accepted, heading towards the car. 

The car ride was odd, because neither one of them exactly started conversations but were more included in them. Eventually, the silence got too hard for him to handle and he glanced at her. 

“Hey, how about you look in the back of the car. I have some old tapes we can play for some music.”

This turned into a whole fiasco, as apparently Hopper only showed her some music. None of the good, popular music the rest of the group seemed to think was infinitely lame. She needed to be caught up! Even if he didn’t particularly like the songs he showed her, she still needed to know. 

“This one’s slow.” Jane pointed out and maybe complained as ‘Total Eclipse of the Heart’ blared through his speakers. 

He smirked. “Yea, this is one of the lovey dovey songs, don’t worry, better ones will come on.”

She bobbed her head rather hilariously as the repetitive ‘Karma Chameleon’ song came on, “This one’s fun.” She noted, and began humming the lyrics under her breath, having caught on to the main chorus. 

He stopped the car outside of the woods, parking it in the lot before getting out. She followed suit with an annoyed groan. 

“We’re going to have to carry these groceries all the way to the forest.” He realized, beginning to slump.

Silently, Jane lifted her hand. He glared at her warningly. “Nope. We’re doing this the non-crazy magic way.”

“Magic?”

“Yea, it means an abnormal ability. In a lot of kids shows.” She nodded. 

“Why cant I use my magic, then?”

“Because someone might see.”

“Nobody’s watching!”

“Well, better safe the sorry, right?”

She growled and held out her hand. He stopped her. “You need to learn not to rely so much on something that hurts you.” He tried, but she just threw her hands up in frustration. 

So she moodily took three bags, and he took three bags on each arm and they trotted their way up the non-existent path and up to officer Hopper’s house, with Jane turning her nose up and being annoyingly stubborn. 

It was freezing out, the wind strong enough to blow the bags away if they weren’t clutching them so tightly. They finally arrived at the small, run down house, and Steve sat down his bags to unlock the door only to realize. 

“Kid, we don’t have keys to the house.”

She had the most shit eating grin on her face. “And?” she asked, crossing her arms. 

“And? Magic it open?”

“I thought I shouldn’t rely so much on my powers.”

He groaned. “Okay well this is something that you can’t do without powers!”

She shrugged, and sat down on the porch, seemingly unfazed by the biting cold. “Nope.”

He threw his arms in the air. After finding no matter what he did to apologize she wouldn’t give in, he joined her on the porch, shivering violently against the cold. 

She smirked at him, a small quirk of her lips. He glared. He tucked his knees under his chin and wrapped his hands up, unable to stop the shivers as the wind blew past them sharply, biting at his skin. 

“You get cold easily.”

“Ha...well, I guess I’m only wearing a sweater.”

After a moment, he glanced at her. “Are you going to open the door now?”

“No.”

“Why not? Look, I know I was a bit strict before and I’m not Hopper, but it’s dangerous to-“

“This isn’t about that.” She shook her head. 

He paused, stumped. 

“You know, my Papa wasn’t very nice either.” She began, and Steve closed his eyes. 

The kid didn’t understand the difference between drunken and illegal testing. She had it a lot worse the he did, in a lot of different ways. At least there was an escape for him. She was tortured 24/7. 

“And even if it’s a lot the same it’s also not the same at all. But you don’t have to pretend your fine. Your’re not, and I learned that there was a difference between pretending and lying from Nancy when she was pretending to like her neighbors.”

She turned to him. 

“No one’s asking you to be fine. So stop pretending you are.”

He closed his eyes as she leaned her head on his shoulder, and heard the door click unlocked in the background. Before standing up, he smiled briefly at the young girl, who was surprisingly wise with how little she spoke. 

“Okay, I’m not fine. But I never will be if I can’t move one. So I’m not pretending because anyone asked me to, I’m pretending because I need to to feel better. I don’t want to be sad. So I’ll pretend I’m not until its true, yea?”

She nodded at him. “Yea. But if you need to talk, just say so, and I’ll listen.”

He held out a hand for her to take, and she grabbed it easily. 

He opened the door to the apartment, hauling his groceries into the room. 

He paused on his way to the kitchen. He turned to her. “Talking...talking would be nice. Can we talk?”

She beamed. “Uh huh! But let’s make Eggos AND talk!” 

Steve let the memoires sweep over him like the cold wind outside.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading I hope you enjoyed! Fluff is great!
> 
> Thanks again, from MistressYin!


End file.
